News from the CDC.

Abstract

As the leading public health agency of the U.S. federal government, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is committed to improving the public's health through practices that are known to make a difference. CDC has the responsibility to engage public health researchers, practitioners, and constituents in making evidence usable by public health practitioners. At the same time, identifying and understanding components of the process of translating research strategies to interventions used in practice are critical. CDC has led the way in articulating those components from a public health perspective and we will continue to work to realize the greatest public health impact from our research and programmatic initiatives. We are excited about the focus of Translational Behavioral Medicine and, in upcoming issues, look forward to sharing with readers some of the other work CDC is doing to effectively translate research into public health practice. As the leading public health agency of the U.S. federal government, the CDC is committed to improving the public's health through practices that are known to make a difference. This commitment is apparent throughout the agency and can be seen clearly in recent activities that aim to prevent and control chronic disease, such as the Communities Putting Prevention to Work (CPPW) initiative. In 2010, CDC awarded over $372 million dollars to states, tribes, and territorial jurisdictions to create healthier communities by reducing obesity, decreasing tobacco use, or both through sustainable, proven, population-based approaches such as broad-based policy, systems, organizational and environmental changes in communities and schools (see http://www.cdc.gov/Features/ChronicPreventionGrants/). CPPW requires applicants to adopt one or more evidence-based strategies that have been specified in a prescribed menu of effective practices. Results of these efforts should lead to measurable improvements in the public's health while informing CDC and its public health partners and stakeholders about a wide range of translation activities in action.